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Women’s Work: Real Estate Investment Management Continues to Be a Male-Dominated Field

by Loretta Clodfelter

The real estate fund management business is dominated by men, especially as you look at the more senior ranks. Reasons for this disparity include latent sexism, women’s higher responsibility for childrearing and a lack of supportive mentors. Diversity is good for business, and increased scrutiny by institutional investors could push general partners to be more supportive of women’s careers.

“This paper may annoy many people.” So begins Cloistered in the Pink Ghetto: Women in Private Equity, Real Estate and Venture Capital, authored by Nori Gerardo Lietz, a working draft of which began circulating around the real estate investment management industry earlier this year.

In the paper, Lietz lays out the evidence for a systematic underrepresentation of women in the investment divisions of private equity, venture capital and private real estate firms. Lietz surveyed the staffing of 283 firms, including 82 real estate firms, to